Archive for the ‘Animal Stories’ Category

Join me on October 20, 2021, at 6 p.m. (ET). as I explore the city’s police and fire history while sharing some amazing stories of Old New York’s four-legged bravest and finest. This will be the debut for my FURst Responders of Gotham presentation, which is a prelude to my (possibly) upcoming book of the same title. Registration is required for this free virtual event.

This story is more than a simple tale about two pet pigs who lived among the 125 men at Camp Thomas Paine in New York City. It is a story about a fascinating commune of war veterans who thought out of the box to survive in 52 makeshift shacks along the Hudson River from 1932 to 1934. And it is, in part, a commentary on a sad and shameful period in our country’s history,

In December 1926, a live cat was shipped from Morrisville, NY, to the Brooklyn General Post Office via the New York, Ontario, and Western Railway. Four wild rabbits also arrived at the post office on the same day, albeit, they were not as fortunate as the cat.

On July 28, 1902, The New York Times reported that a seven-month-old, 45-pound, grey-brown panther had gnawed his way out of a large pine shipping box near the park’s Puma and Lynx House. It was the first time the captive cat–which had just been shipped via a Ward Line steamship from Mr. Charles Sheldon of the Mexican Zoological Society in Chihuahua to Director William Temple Hornaday of the New York Zoological Society–had ever experienced a taste of freedom.

Here’s a short little ditty about Mr. and Mrs. Payne Whitney that you can add to your New York City history trivia collection. It will give you a fun story to tell as you walk past the Whitney mansion on Fifth Avenue at 79th Street…